Science education group decides it’s time to tackle climate change

The National Center for Science Education, which defends teachers that want to …

The National Center for Science Education has been defending the teaching of evolution since before Edwards vs. Aguillard, the 1987 Supreme Court decision that declared the teaching of creationism an unconstitutional promotion of religion. Although its primary focus is on supporting teachers and students by helping them handle public controversies caused by science education, the organization played a critical role in the Dover case, which blocked the teaching of creationism's descendent, intelligent design.

Although the organization's title refers to science education generally, evolution has been the primary area of science that has been under attack for reasons that have nothing to do with the latest research. But over the last several years, that's changed as more and more bills have been introduced that target both evolution and climate change. With times changing, the NCSE is changing with them. Today, it's announcing that its support of students and educators will be broadened to include climate change. We talked with the NCSE's executive director, Eugenie Scott, about the decision.

Scott said that the NCSE's work with teachers on evolution made them aware that teaching climate science was becoming controversial. "It's been a growing realization of ours that, just as teachers get hammered for teaching evolution, they also are getting hammered for teaching global warming and other climate change topics," she told Ars. "They'll start talking about global warming and a student's hand will shoot up, 'teacher, my dad says global warming is a hoax.' We've had accounts where students would get up and walk out of the room."

The NCSE also heard about school boards that enacted policies that would dictate how things would be handled in the classrooms, and noticed the legislation we mentioned above. Scott said that all these events left the NCSE staff thinking "we really should look into this."

What they found were some clear parallels between evolution and climate science. Just as the controversy over evolution takes place within the public and not among scientists, Scott said, "There's not a debate going on within the science community about whether the climate is getting warm and whether people have a great deal to do with this." There were also parallels in terms of motivation. "The basis for antievolution is ideological," Scott said, pointing to its religious nature. "There's also an idealogical basis for anti-global warming, it just happens to be a political and economic ideology."

The details of the arguments differ—"creationists don't talk a lot about sun spots," Scott joked—but the NCSE considers the structure of the arguments to be very similar. Ultimately, "Both [groups] are making a pedagogical argument, that it is somehow good pedagogy, good critical thinking, for students to learn both. That it is somehow a good pedagogy for students to learn good science and bad science."

Because of these similarities, the NCSE has decided that their past experience can be helpful. "The anti-climate change controversy is about where the antievolution controversy was 20 years ago," Scott told Ars. "We've learned a lot—we including the scientific community—dealing with the evolution controversy and, with luck, maybe we can get ahead of this." One of the things they've learned is that the "deficit model"—the idea that people don't like the science because they don't understand it—doesn't really apply. "You're not going to be effective if you are talking about only throwing more science at people who hold different views from you—you have to deal with the ideological component as well," Scott said. "Our experience with that will hopefully be useful."

As with evolution, most of the focus will be on tracking efforts by state legislators to dictate how science education is handled (Scott says there are already five bills that target evolution active in various states). The NCSE will also continue to advise and support teachers and families that find science education under attack in their communities. Right now, many schools don't teach climate science at all; if they do, it's likely to be in middle school earth sciences or high school ecology classes. But that may change, as Scott said national science standards that are in the works are poised to include climate science, and nearly half the states have promised to adopt them.

But there will be some distinct challenges. "We've always argued 'do what's best for the kids, teach good science.' The nice thing about evolution is that we can also say 'and by the way, if you try to teach creationism/intelligent design, you will be sued and you will lose, because all the case law is against you,'" Scott said. "There's nothing comparable with climate change. There's no constitutional protection against bad science. What we have to do is persuade people, help them understand what is good science, and why their kids should learn good science."

To help get the organization ready for the challenge of persuading people, the NCSE has hired Mark McCaffrey, a scientist that has focused on climate literacy. They've also placed the Pacific Institute's Peter Gleick on their board.

For now, Scott doesn't see any other areas that the NCSE would need to handle. She called politically controversial scientific topics the group's "ecological niche," since the group's goal is to try to keep the politics out of science education: "Our big concern is that science education not be politicized. We see it happening with climate change science. We'd like to do what we can the help teachers from keeping it from getting worse."

613 Reader Comments

- The nice thing about evolution is that we can also say 'and by the way, if you try to teach creationism/intelligent design, you will be sued and you will lose, because all the case law is against you,'" Scott said. -

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

- The nice thing about evolution is that we can also say 'and by the way, if you try to teach creationism/intelligent design, you will be sued and you will lose, because all the case law is against you,'" Scott said. -

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

Creationism isn't about scientific inquiry. It's about injecting religion into a science course.

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

The fact that the particular case of Creationism falling afoul of 1st Amendment issues is convenient for keeping science education scientific regarding evolution is what's being pointed out here. Unfortunately there's no such constitutional protection against climate denier pseudoscience. Let's please not turn this into another tired old climate denial argument thread, I've had to swear those off to avoid fist-through-monitor syndrome over the holidays. There are plenty of other threads where global warming arguments have been played out, go resurrect one of those please.

Good news, we need more of the same. This approach has been pretty sound at getting religion out of the biology classroom, it would be nice to see it used to make school science more rigorous in general.

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

The fact that the particular case of Creationism falling afoul of 1st Amendment issues is convenient for keeping science education scientific regarding evolution is what's being pointed out here. Unfortunately there's no such constitutional protection against climate denier pseudoscience. Let's please not turn this into another tired old climate denial argument thread, I've had to swear those off to avoid fist-through-monitor syndrome over the holidays. There are plenty of other threads where global warming arguments have been played out, go resurrect one of those please.

I've had to swear those off for the past month as well. I really wish there was some way of declaring something debunked and not permitting it to be repeated.

- The nice thing about evolution is that we can also say 'and by the way, if you try to teach creationism/intelligent design, you will be sued and you will lose, because all the case law is against you,'" Scott said. -

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

Creationism isn't about scientific inquiry. It's about injecting religion into a science course.

As much so as the overstatement of "evolution" from "evolution occurs" to "only evolution occurs", which in this latter equivocated form is wholly untestable and unscientific, is an injection of atheism into science?

- The nice thing about evolution is that we can also say 'and by the way, if you try to teach creationism/intelligent design, you will be sued and you will lose, because all the case law is against you,'" Scott said. -

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

See that? That's called quotemining. The full quote contained information about the focus on solid science, which just happened to be associated with a set of helpful legal precedents. By "mining" a small piece of it and removing the surrounding context, you attempted to make it all about the legal aspect. Unfortunately for you, quotemining is far, far less effective when it's done on the same page as the full quote.

Somewhat ironically, quotemining is a tool favored by creationists, so something that the NCSE is very, very familiar with.

- The nice thing about evolution is that we can also say 'and by the way, if you try to teach creationism/intelligent design, you will be sued and you will lose, because all the case law is against you,'" Scott said. -

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

He actually said the opposite. That there is no protection from bad science there is only protection from religion disguised as science.

Creationism is based off of a religion. AGW is not. There are similarities between the two, Unfortunately as he said it steps on freedom of speech to try to force Climate Change in schools through court. Schools which we rely upon in good faith to teach the courses they say they will teach not change subjects at whim to misrepresent a debate.

Evolution by the way was once challenged to even be allowed to be taught in schools. It was a famous trial the early part of the 20th century.

- The nice thing about evolution is that we can also say 'and by the way, if you try to teach creationism/intelligent design, you will be sued and you will lose, because all the case law is against you,'" Scott said. -

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

Creationism isn't about scientific inquiry. It's about injecting religion into a science course.

As much so as the overstatement of "evolution" from "evolution occurs" to "only evolution occurs", which in this latter equivocated form is wholly untestable and unscientific, is an injection of atheism into science?

1. Evolution is not dependent on Atheism, nor Atheism dependent on the other. Don't confuse the two.2. It's fine to say "there may be stuff going on other than Evolution." That's perfectly fine. Trouble is, those "other things" require the same burden of proof that Evolution itself must shoulder. ID/Creationism do not fulfill that requirement, nor has anything else. There may be other processes at work, however there is no evidence of such.

The question is, is NCSE sincere about keeping politics out of science? Or only about keeping "wrong" politics out of science? I can distinctly recall more than a little blatant politics-based sciencing in my high-school science classes, particularly on the issue of GMOs.

- The nice thing about evolution is that we can also say 'and by the way, if you try to teach creationism/intelligent design, you will be sued and you will lose, because all the case law is against you,'" Scott said. -

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

Creationism isn't about scientific inquiry. It's about injecting religion into a science course.

As much so as the overstatement of "evolution" from "evolution occurs" to "only evolution occurs", which in this latter equivocated form is wholly untestable and unscientific, is an injection of atheism into science?

When they teach evolution in biology, they explain natural selection and the gradual change of species that results. This is based upon empirical scientific evidence and is the foundation of modern biology and biochemistry. If you have evidence that calls the theory of evolution into question and points towards intelligent design or whatever you call it, feel free to write a paper about it and get it published.

Or you could keep visciously attacking the strawmen you create I guess v(o.o)v

- The nice thing about evolution is that we can also say 'and by the way, if you try to teach creationism/intelligent design, you will be sued and you will lose, because all the case law is against you,'" Scott said. -

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

He actually said the opposite. That there is no protection from bad science there is only protection from religion disguised as science.

Creationism is based off of a religion. AGW is not. There are similarities between the two, Unfortunately as he said it steps on freedom of speech to try to force Climate Change in schools through court. Schools which we rely upon in good faith to teach the courses they say they will teach not change subjects at whim to misrepresent a debate.

Evolution by the way was once challenged to even be allowed to be taught in schools. It was a famous trial the early part of the 20th century.

Do either of us doubt in the slightest way that absolutely regardless of what's presented, it will automatically be characterized as "religion disguised as science" precisely insofar as one holds an atheistic worldview? Since the Big Bang was originally proposed by a theist, what, on this basis, would you say should have been done -at the point it was proposed-, scientifically? Fortunately, science is ultimately impervious to mere dismissal by such subjective characterization.

- The nice thing about evolution is that we can also say 'and by the way, if you try to teach creationism/intelligent design, you will be sued and you will lose, because all the case law is against you,'" Scott said. -

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

Creationism isn't about scientific inquiry. It's about injecting religion into a science course.

As much so as the overstatement of "evolution" from "evolution occurs" to "only evolution occurs", which in this latter equivocated form is wholly untestable and unscientific, is an injection of atheism into science?

When they teach evolution in biology, they explain natural selection and the gradual change of species that results. This is based upon empirical scientific evidence and is the foundation of modern biology and biochemistry. If you have evidence that calls the theory of evolution into question and points towards intelligent design or whatever you call it, feel free to write a paper about it and get it published.

Or you could keep visciously attacking the strawmen you create I guess v(o.o)v

Yes, and I'm fully in agreement with the notion that evolution occurs, per scientific findings. The non-sequitur amplification "only evolution occurs", although crucial for an atheistic viewpoint, happens to, in fact, be wholly untestable, and must be rejected on that basis for anyone to remain in the domain of science. Science has found precisely what it has found to date, and has not found what it has not. That you -hope- the future resolves to continuing in that vein, has nothing to do with valid science.

Creationists and climate change deniers are nearly identical in the way they carry out their anti-science agenda. They use the same tricks, tactics and methods. So the NCSE's experience will be very helpful here.

The only thing that worries me slightly is that the NCSE seems to want to promote the idea that religion and science are compatible, which kind of undermines their main message. It might be easier to get moderate religious people on board that way, but it's counter-productive in the long run.

- The nice thing about evolution is that we can also say 'and by the way, if you try to teach creationism/intelligent design, you will be sued and you will lose, because all the case law is against you,'" Scott said. -

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

Creationism isn't about scientific inquiry. It's about injecting religion into a science course.

As much so as the overstatement of "evolution" from "evolution occurs" to "only evolution occurs", which in this latter equivocated form is wholly untestable and unscientific, is an injection of atheism into science?

When they teach evolution in biology, they explain natural selection and the gradual change of species that results. This is based upon empirical scientific evidence and is the foundation of modern biology and biochemistry. If you have evidence that calls the theory of evolution into question and points towards intelligent design or whatever you call it, feel free to write a paper about it and get it published.

Or you could keep visciously attacking the strawmen you create I guess v(o.o)v

Yes, and I'm fully in agreement with the notion that evolution occurs, per scientific findings. The non-sequitur amplification "only evolution occurs", although crucial for an atheistic viewpoint, happens to, in fact, be wholly untestable, and must be rejected on that basis for anyone to remain in the domain of science. Science has found precisely what it has found to date, and has not found what it has not. That you -hope- the future resolves to continuing in that vein, has nothing to do with valid science.

The "Atheistic Worldview" does NOT require Evolution to be the only game in town. It doesn't even require Evolution in the first place (protip: Atheism predates Evolution). It only requires there to not be a deity pulling the strings.

By the way, there is no bloody conspiracy to prevent explanations of the complexity of life other than Evolution. There IS a conspiracy to prevent blatantly religious explanations to masquerade as science. 'Cause you know, they're not science.

Yes, and I'm fully in agreement with the notion that evolution occurs, per scientific findings. The non-sequitur amplification "only evolution occurs", although crucial for an atheistic viewpoint, happens to, in fact, be wholly untestable, and must be rejected on that basis for anyone to remain in the domain of science. Science has found precisely what it has found to date, and has not found what it has not. That you -hope- the future resolves to continuing in that vein, has nothing to do with valid science.

It's scientifically valid to say the following:There is no evidence for any mechanisms other than evolution being involved in the generation of life's diversity.Evolutionary mechanisms can successfully account for all of the diversity we currently identified.

And, in fact, it's important to teach those, so that students understand why all biological results are interpreted within an evolutionary framework.

- The nice thing about evolution is that we can also say 'and by the way, if you try to teach creationism/intelligent design, you will be sued and you will lose, because all the case law is against you,'" Scott said. -

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

Creationism isn't about scientific inquiry. It's about injecting religion into a science course.

As much so as the overstatement of "evolution" from "evolution occurs" to "only evolution occurs", which in this latter equivocated form is wholly untestable and unscientific, is an injection of atheism into science?

When they teach evolution in biology, they explain natural selection and the gradual change of species that results. This is based upon empirical scientific evidence and is the foundation of modern biology and biochemistry. If you have evidence that calls the theory of evolution into question and points towards intelligent design or whatever you call it, feel free to write a paper about it and get it published.

Or you could keep visciously attacking the strawmen you create I guess v(o.o)v

Yes, and I'm fully in agreement with the notion that evolution occurs, per scientific findings. The non-sequitur amplification "only evolution occurs", although crucial for an atheistic viewpoint, happens to, in fact, be wholly untestable, and must be rejected on that basis for anyone to remain in the domain of science. Science has found precisely what it has found to date, and has not found what it has not. That you -hope- the future resolves to continuing in that vein, has nothing to do with valid science.

To be clear, atheists do not require that only evolution occurs. They do require a natural explanation for other proposals however as they do not accept the presence of a diety as I understand it(or require a very high burden of proof on the basis of 'extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof).

- The nice thing about evolution is that we can also say 'and by the way, if you try to teach creationism/intelligent design, you will be sued and you will lose, because all the case law is against you,'" Scott said. -

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

He actually said the opposite. That there is no protection from bad science there is only protection from religion disguised as science.

Creationism is based off of a religion. AGW is not. There are similarities between the two, Unfortunately as he said it steps on freedom of speech to try to force Climate Change in schools through court. Schools which we rely upon in good faith to teach the courses they say they will teach not change subjects at whim to misrepresent a debate.

Evolution by the way was once challenged to even be allowed to be taught in schools. It was a famous trial the early part of the 20th century.

Do either of us doubt in the slightest way that absolutely regardless of what's presented, it will automatically be characterized as "religion disguised as science" precisely insofar as one holds an atheistic worldview? Since the Big Bang was originally proposed by a theist, what, on this basis, would you say should have been done -at the point it was proposed-, scientifically? Fortunately, science is ultimately impervious to mere dismissal by such subjective characterization.

I don't because science is supposed to be based upon observation. Creationism us called "religion disguised as science" because it borrows heavily from religion and does not provide any observational data to support it.

Evolution does not preclude religion even abiogenesis does not preclude religion. If supporters of creationism had developed a theory that was based on observational data than they would have more support from me but I haven't seen any yet. At best I see stuff that tries to disprove a theory....which even if evolution is wrong does not make creationism right.

If you say it can't be proven because its a creators hand than that falls outside of science it belongs in philosophy, social studies, and religion classes but not science which requires proof not summation or hyperbole.

- The nice thing about evolution is that we can also say 'and by the way, if you try to teach creationism/intelligent design, you will be sued and you will lose, because all the case law is against you,'" Scott said. -

The nice thing about science is, you know lines of scientific inquiry are completed when a lawyer in a black robe says so. As long as he's sitting on an elevated platform.

Creationism isn't about scientific inquiry. It's about injecting religion into a science course.

As much so as the overstatement of "evolution" from "evolution occurs" to "only evolution occurs", which in this latter equivocated form is wholly untestable and unscientific, is an injection of atheism into science?

When they teach evolution in biology, they explain natural selection and the gradual change of species that results. This is based upon empirical scientific evidence and is the foundation of modern biology and biochemistry. If you have evidence that calls the theory of evolution into question and points towards intelligent design or whatever you call it, feel free to write a paper about it and get it published.

Or you could keep visciously attacking the strawmen you create I guess v(o.o)v

Yes, and I'm fully in agreement with the notion that evolution occurs, per scientific findings. The non-sequitur amplification "only evolution occurs", although crucial for an atheistic viewpoint, happens to, in fact, be wholly untestable, and must be rejected on that basis for anyone to remain in the domain of science. Science has found precisely what it has found to date, and has not found what it has not. That you -hope- the future resolves to continuing in that vein, has nothing to do with valid science.

The "Atheistic Worldview" does NOT require Evolution to be the only game in town. It doesn't even require Evolution in the first place (protip: Atheism predates Evolution). It only requires there to not be a deity pulling the strings.

By the way, there is no bloody conspiracy to prevent explanations of the complexity of life other than Evolution. There IS a conspiracy to prevent blatantly religious explanations to masquerade as science. 'Cause you know, they're not science.

Are you serious? There is overt political and legal suppression of the notion of complexity arising from -any- source other than evolutionary processes. That is the very scope of ID. That many want to simply draw a false equivalence between "ID" and "creationism", to trot in a series of ad hominem arguments, doesn't determine what words, as words, simply mean. Intelligent Design. Okay, what term would you -prefer- for the generic notion that design may be a causal factor, leaving open any source (e.g. extraterrestrials) by not specifying any particular ones in the term? I suggest there is no better possible way to describe the domain in inquiry, as it actually is, as opposed to how it's immediately mischaracterized. Okay, so someday we might want to consider whether certain biological characteristics were in part modified by the genetic engineering of extraterrestrials--what do you want to call that idea, if not Intelligent Design? There is, I submit, no means of describing the concept that would be acceptable, as the approach that is being taken is simply directly equivalent to Orwell's "crimethink", just not quite at the stage of eliminating the words, and hence the concept, from the dictionary.

Yes, and I'm fully in agreement with the notion that evolution occurs, per scientific findings. The non-sequitur amplification "only evolution occurs", although crucial for an atheistic viewpoint, happens to, in fact, be wholly untestable, and must be rejected on that basis for anyone to remain in the domain of science. Science has found precisely what it has found to date, and has not found what it has not. That you -hope- the future resolves to continuing in that vein, has nothing to do with valid science.

It's scientifically valid to say the following:There is no evidence for any mechanisms other than evolution being involved in the generation of life's diversity.Evolutionary mechanisms can successfully account for all of the diversity we currently identified.

And, in fact, it's important to teach those, so that students understand why all biological results are interpreted within an evolutionary framework.

Do you have an issue with that presentation?

Well, no, first of all, it is factually incorrect to say "There is no evidence for any mechanisms other than evolution being involved in the generation of life's diversity" or "Evolutionary mechanisms can successfully account for all of the diversity we currently identified", as a matter of scientific fact. Fluorescent cats are part of "life's diversity", and we know they are designed by the fact we designed them, along with a number of other biological entities. As stated, the premises are now simply false. Did you want to qualify the statement to refer to "biology before year X"? If so, please do.

Are you serious? There is overt political and legal suppression of the notion of complexity arising from -any- source other than evolutionary processes. That is the very scope of ID. That many want to simply draw a false equivalence between "ID" and "creationism", to trot in a series of ad hominem arguments, doesn't determine what words, as words, simply mean. Intelligent Design. Okay, what term would you -prefer- for the generic notion that design may be a causal factor, leaving open any source (e.g. extraterrestrials) by not specifying any particular ones in the term? I suggest there is no better possible way to describe the domain in inquiry, as it actually is, as opposed to how it's immediately mischaracterized. Okay, so someday we might want to consider whether certain biological characteristics were in part modified by the genetic engineering of extraterrestrials--what do you want to call that idea, if not Intelligent Design? There is, I submit, no means of describing the concept that would be acceptable, as the approach that is being taken is simply directly equivalent to Orwell's "crimethink", just not quite at the stage of eliminating the words, and hence the concept, from the dictionary.

What term would you prefer?

Why would the bar be lower for ID or any other proposed theory than it is for Evolution? Evolution has had to cross some extremely high hurdles to reach mainstream acceptance, why wouldn't we expect ID to be able to answer the same kinds of questions and make the same kinds of predictions as evolutionary theory? Are you really proposing the bar be lowered to permit pet theories to be taught?

Creationism isn't about scientific inquiry. It's about injecting religion into a science course.

As much so as the overstatement of "evolution" from "evolution occurs" to "only evolution occurs", which in this latter equivocated form is wholly untestable and unscientific, is an injection of atheism into science?

When they teach evolution in biology, they explain natural selection and the gradual change of species that results. This is based upon empirical scientific evidence and is the foundation of modern biology and biochemistry. If you have evidence that calls the theory of evolution into question and points towards intelligent design or whatever you call it, feel free to write a paper about it and get it published.

Or you could keep visciously attacking the strawmen you create I guess v(o.o)v

Yes, and I'm fully in agreement with the notion that evolution occurs, per scientific findings. The non-sequitur amplification "only evolution occurs", although crucial for an atheistic viewpoint, happens to, in fact, be wholly untestable, and must be rejected on that basis for anyone to remain in the domain of science. Science has found precisely what it has found to date, and has not found what it has not. That you -hope- the future resolves to continuing in that vein, has nothing to do with valid science.

The "Atheistic Worldview" does NOT require Evolution to be the only game in town. It doesn't even require Evolution in the first place (protip: Atheism predates Evolution). It only requires there to not be a deity pulling the strings.

By the way, there is no bloody conspiracy to prevent explanations of the complexity of life other than Evolution. There IS a conspiracy to prevent blatantly religious explanations to masquerade as science. 'Cause you know, they're not science.

Are you serious? There is overt political and legal suppression of the notion of complexity arising from -any- source other than evolutionary processes. That is the very scope of ID. That many want to simply draw a false equivalence between "ID" and "creationism", to trot in a series of ad hominem arguments, doesn't determine what words, as words, simply mean. Intelligent Design. Okay, what term would you -prefer- for the generic notion that design may be a causal factor, leaving open any source (e.g. extraterrestrials) by not specifying any particular ones in the term? I suggest there is no better possible way to describe the domain in inquiry, as it actually is, as opposed to how it's immediately mischaracterized. Okay, so someday we might want to consider whether certain biological characteristics were in part modified by the genetic engineering of extraterrestrials--what do you want to call that idea, if not Intelligent Design? There is, I submit, no means of describing the concept that would be acceptable, as the approach that is being taken is simply directly equivalent to Orwell's "crimethink", just not quite at the stage of eliminating the words, and hence the concept, from the dictionary.

What term would you prefer?

Oh please. Pretending that ID is anything other than Creationism dressed up in fancier wording is absolutely silly. ID was developed in response to Creationism failing legal challenge. Look up the book "Of Pandas and People," the straight up hack job copy/paste that was done to switch it from Creationism to Intelligent Design. ID is a trojan horse, and the Dover trial displayed that beyond the shadow of a doubt. Understand that there really is no conspiracy to prevent processes other than Evolution from being considered; rather there's a conspiracy to prevent Creationism/ID from being considered, because they are not science.

Even if you disgard the religious element, all ID has is "maybe life is too complex to have arisen without help." Well ok, but that's a hypothesis at best, and one that doesn't actually have any evidence backing it ("irreducible complexity" isn't evidence, there's nothing backing it). If you want to be taken seriously as a theory, you have to bring something to the table.

Yes, and I'm fully in agreement with the notion that evolution occurs, per scientific findings. The non-sequitur amplification "only evolution occurs", although crucial for an atheistic viewpoint, happens to, in fact, be wholly untestable, and must be rejected on that basis for anyone to remain in the domain of science. Science has found precisely what it has found to date, and has not found what it has not. That you -hope- the future resolves to continuing in that vein, has nothing to do with valid science.

It's scientifically valid to say the following:There is no evidence for any mechanisms other than evolution being involved in the generation of life's diversity.Evolutionary mechanisms can successfully account for all of the diversity we currently identified.

And, in fact, it's important to teach those, so that students understand why all biological results are interpreted within an evolutionary framework.

Do you have an issue with that presentation?

Well, no, first of all, it is factually incorrect to say "There is no evidence for any mechanisms other than evolution being involved in the generation of life's diversity" or "Evolutionary mechanisms can successfully account for all of the diversity we currently identified", as a matter of scientific fact. Fluorescent cats are part of "life's diversity", and we know they are designed by the fact we designed them, along with a number of other biological entities. As stated, the premises are now simply false. Did you want to qualify the statement to refer to "biology before year X"? If so, please do.

We designed them by nature of our knowledge of evolution. Genetic modifications have not been made possible or utilized processes dependent upon our knoweldge of Intelligent Design.

Yes, and I'm fully in agreement with the notion that evolution occurs, per scientific findings. The non-sequitur amplification "only evolution occurs", although crucial for an atheistic viewpoint, happens to, in fact, be wholly untestable, and must be rejected on that basis for anyone to remain in the domain of science. Science has found precisely what it has found to date, and has not found what it has not. That you -hope- the future resolves to continuing in that vein, has nothing to do with valid science.

It's scientifically valid to say the following:There is no evidence for any mechanisms other than evolution being involved in the generation of life's diversity.Evolutionary mechanisms can successfully account for all of the diversity we currently identified.

And, in fact, it's important to teach those, so that students understand why all biological results are interpreted within an evolutionary framework.

Do you have an issue with that presentation?

Well, no, first of all, it is factually incorrect to say "There is no evidence for any mechanisms other than evolution being involved in the generation of life's diversity" or "Evolutionary mechanisms can successfully account for all of the diversity we currently identified", as a matter of scientific fact. Fluorescent cats are part of "life's diversity", and we know they are designed by the fact we designed them, along with a number of other biological entities. As stated, the premises are now simply false. Did you want to qualify the statement to refer to "biology before year X"? If so, please do.

That's a fair point. How about we qualify that with "excepting those organisms that have been genetically modified by humans", since that would cover artificial selection through breeding? Which, although it constituted a significant portion of Darwin's book, was clearly recognized as a distinct process.

Are you serious? There is overt political and legal suppression of the notion of complexity arising from -any- source other than evolutionary processes. That is the very scope of ID. That many want to simply draw a false equivalence between "ID" and "creationism", to trot in a series of ad hominem arguments, doesn't determine what words, as words, simply mean. Intelligent Design. Okay, what term would you -prefer- for the generic notion that design may be a causal factor, leaving open any source (e.g. extraterrestrials) by not specifying any particular ones in the term? I suggest there is no better possible way to describe the domain in inquiry, as it actually is, as opposed to how it's immediately mischaracterized. Okay, so someday we might want to consider whether certain biological characteristics were in part modified by the genetic engineering of extraterrestrials--what do you want to call that idea, if not Intelligent Design? There is, I submit, no means of describing the concept that would be acceptable, as the approach that is being taken is simply directly equivalent to Orwell's "crimethink", just not quite at the stage of eliminating the words, and hence the concept, from the dictionary.

What term would you prefer?

Why would the bar be lower for ID or any other proposed theory than it is for Evolution? Evolution has had to cross some extremely high hurdles to reach mainstream acceptance, why wouldn't we expect ID to be able to answer the same kinds of questions and make the same kinds of predictions as evolutionary theory? Are you really proposing the bar be lowered to permit pet theories to be taught?

Okay, again, let's be very careful here. I fully support "evolution occurs", as a fully-scientific, and true, statement. I do not accept "only evolution occurs", because it is an untestable inference, and not science. Its this amplification I take issue with, in support of science. That one -claims- they support science, rather than religion, doesn't preclude the possibility they aren't validly supporting either one.

The NCSE has a lot of ties to education at all levels, and a lot of feet on the ground when it comes to researching claims from a legal standpoint as well to arm them in litigation. Their experience with anti-evolutionism should be a good starting point in figuring out how to deal with AGW denialism in the public sphere, and I'm glad to see them taking on climate specialists. It'll be great to have them helping out at the school (and possibly court room) level, I'm just worried that they'll be swamped by the sheer size and funding of anti-AGWers.

What about sex education and the clearly religiously motivated teaching of abstinence only sex ed in many schools? NCSE should have started protecting global warming years ago and it seems they are still unwilling to campaign on behalf of the more touchy subject of real sex education which is actually much more closely related to the teaching of evolution, given that they are both religious objections to biology.

Yes, and I'm fully in agreement with the notion that evolution occurs, per scientific findings. The non-sequitur amplification "only evolution occurs", although crucial for an atheistic viewpoint, happens to, in fact, be wholly untestable, and must be rejected on that basis for anyone to remain in the domain of science. Science has found precisely what it has found to date, and has not found what it has not. That you -hope- the future resolves to continuing in that vein, has nothing to do with valid science.

It's scientifically valid to say the following:There is no evidence for any mechanisms other than evolution being involved in the generation of life's diversity.Evolutionary mechanisms can successfully account for all of the diversity we currently identified.

And, in fact, it's important to teach those, so that students understand why all biological results are interpreted within an evolutionary framework.

Do you have an issue with that presentation?

Well, no, first of all, it is factually incorrect to say "There is no evidence for any mechanisms other than evolution being involved in the generation of life's diversity" or "Evolutionary mechanisms can successfully account for all of the diversity we currently identified", as a matter of scientific fact. Fluorescent cats are part of "life's diversity", and we know they are designed by the fact we designed them, along with a number of other biological entities. As stated, the premises are now simply false. Did you want to qualify the statement to refer to "biology before year X"? If so, please do.

That's a fair point. How about we qualify that with "excepting those organisms that have been genetically modified by humans", since that would cover artificial selection through breeding? Which, although it constituted a significant portion of Darwin's book, was clearly recognized as a distinct process.

Then, I suggest, your scoping here is a presumption, suggested by the data, but not conclusive. We'd need an alternate case by which it could be falsified, and as such we'd need to produce a test for, say, "pre-1900's genetic engineering", of which IC is the currently-attacked target. Nonetheless, we'd have to avoid a tautological definition where anything utilizing material processes is considered wholly explained by those processes. We cannot scope -precisely- the causal factors for fluorescent cats, without putting "engineer's consciousness" somewhere in that causal chain, but that isn't inferrable from the biological structure--we just happen to know it's the case because we read our media.

Admittedly, the epistemological position you are in, due to your field, is a bit different than "the only reason we can tell one way or the other is we read that a genetic engineer did this", but it still would not be, it seems, inferrable from the biology alone in all cases, and so the tendency would be to infer there was no such causal dependency, in the absence of "seeing it" in the DNA. This is, however, an inference and not testable.

IMO creationists are idiots with some anal problem and little imagination. Typical religious zealots in other words. They'd rather believe a cobbled together old book of questionable pedigree (Old/New Testament, Torah, Quran) edited by equally questionable groups (various churches) with histories that are known to be violent and intolerant to those of other beliefs. They take things from old books literally - imagine what the Sect of Sauron may think 2000 years from now when they interpret LOTR. I find it strange that anyone can take creationists seriously.

Science and religion can easily go hand in hand - just don't take religion too literally.

What next? Supporting geopolitics and pretend that Washington DC is not the center of the Earth? Fair sexual education? The real facts about GMOs?Do any of these NCSE guys realize that if kids become smarter than us, they will steal our job?!? ^-^